Dan is my boyfriend. He is great, but I won't go in to that here because he reads this and it would go to his head. He doesn't cook very often and claims he isn't very talented, but I have seen proof to the contrary. He will help me cook though, and we do this fairly often. We've gotten quite proficient at making pizza (there will be posts about our pizza in the future, I'm sure). Dan loves mac and cheese; his favorite used to be blue cheese mac and cheese from the Blue Onion (which is unfortunately now closed). This recipe is my attempt to claim the favorite spot.

Most recipes for mac and cheese call for so much cheese, it makes my heart hurt just looking at it. I used less than half the cheese and it was still plenty cheesy. Blue cheese is not my favorite so I only used about a quarter of a cup, but it mellows out a lot when it cooks so next time I'll use more. If blue cheese isn't your thing either and you aren't trying to impress your boyfriend, you should use any cheese you want.

Now, just macaroni with bubbly cheese is plenty enjoyable. But maybe a little boring. And this is a contender for the best mac and cheese ever, so we can't have boring. To reach maximum delciousness I added some bacon and broccoli and red onion and spices. This recipe can and should be modified based on personal preference. If bacon and broccoli does not sound appealing use anything else (peas and ham, sun-dried tomatoes, spinach whatever) or if you're a purist just mac and cheese.